


The Miracle of Minor Mercies

by A_Diamond



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Amnesia, Body Horror, Dying Sam, Episode: s07e17 The Born-Again Identity, Faith Healing, Hurt No Comfort, Leviathans, M/M, Minor Character Death, Pining, Priest Castiel, Road Trips, Season/Series 07, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-05-10
Packaged: 2018-10-30 07:38:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10872174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Diamond/pseuds/A_Diamond
Summary: Cas is gone, dissolved into the monsters he let loose on the world, but Dean’s busy dealing with the way he broke Sam, and how the doctors don’t know if there’s anything they can do for him. Desperation leads him to a small parish in Montana and a priest who can perform miracles. What he finds instead is an angel who thinks he’s human, who doesn’t remember who he is or what he’s done.Father Emmanuel only knows what the bishop has told him about his life before the accident. But he’s been blessed with a miraculous gift ever since, and it’s his duty to channel God’s healing to those most in need—no matter what the cost to him. When a man comes to beg help for his dying brother, Emmanuel feels compelled to travel with him and offer his aid. At every Divinely inspired stop they make along the way, Emmanuel’s gift leaves him weaker and the villains whispering darkness inside his mind that much stronger.





	The Miracle of Minor Mercies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BehindTheCellarDoor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BehindTheCellarDoor/gifts).



> A world of thanks to the artist who inspired this story, [Impalartsociopath](http://impalartsociopath.tumblr.com). Art for the story is embedded (and **does contain spoilers!** ) and can also be found on his post [here!](http://impalartsociopath.tumblr.com/post/160520996685/the-miracle-of-minor-mercies-written-by-a)
> 
> And also to [Lauren/superhoney](https://pomegranatedaffodil.tumblr.com/), my most wonderful and not even a little heartless beta.
> 
>  **Warnings:** See end notes for explanation of MCD warning

The miracle Dean needs is somewhere inside this building. Within the red brick walls, under the light slate roof, behind the huge windows that look like dozens of other churches Dean’s seen in his life—and schools and libraries and courthouses too—is his best chance at getting Sam back for good. After the Cage, the wall, and the breakdown, he’s out of options and scrambling for any hope at all. Even if Sam’s given up.

So when he got a tip about a priest with the power to heal any ailment, one already vetted by a hunter and less than a six hour drive from where he’d been looking for answers in Rufus’s cabin, of course he went. He was in the car before even hanging up with Mackey, on the road already while he was still trying to look up directions to Livingston.

It’s just past dusk and the parochial school is dark and closed, but yellow light spills out of a couple of windows near the back of the church. He’s deciding whether to try the main doors or go around to what he assumes is the rectory when someone makes the choice for him.

Stepping out of a side door Dean hadn’t even considered among his options, a man in his seventies or eighties with a priest’s collar and a kindly face asks, “Can I help you, young man?”

Dean’s voice sticks in his throat and he has to cough it loose, because his first words to the man who might save his brother’s life feel heavier than they should for being so common. “Yeah. I’m, uh. I’m looking for Father Emmanuel?”

The priest smiles. “I thought you might be.”

“It’s my brother,” Dean starts, but the man rests a wrinkled hand on his shoulder and he falls silent.

“I’m happy to listen if it’ll help you, son, but I’m not the man you’re after. I’m Father Ryan, the head pastor here.”

Ryan offers his hand and Dean shakes it. He feels a little dazed, the adrenaline of following up on Mackey’s lead long gone. His hard-learned cynicism fights with the hope that wants to bubble up in its wake, but not even at his most pessimistic will he give up on Sam.

“Good to meet you, sir,” he says quietly, and the priest is gracious enough not to ask after Dean’s name. Probably used to dealing with the damaged, given his profession.

“Father Emmanuel is getting ready for bed, but I’m sure he won’t mind delaying for you and your brother. He never does.”

Ryan turns, then turns back as though he can feel Dean’s hesitance. “Come on in,” he says, “I won’t make you wait out in the cold and dark. Would you like some tea or coffee?”

“Coffee would be great, thanks,” says Dean as he follows after him. “Not that I’m complaining, but do you let every random stranger who turns up in the dead of night come in? Doesn’t seem like the safest idea.”

Not that a lack of invitation would stop most things that want to get in. Especially with something as tempting as an apparently miraculous priest acting as a lure. Dean can think of any number of malevolent forces that might be interested in powers like Emmanuel’s, none of which give a shit about a improperly consecrated ground. If the guy turns out to be the real deal as promised, Dean’ll have to leave him with some tips about real protection.

Ryan just smiles back at him, distant light catching in the creases of his face. He looks worn but not tired as he says, “Our doors are always open to those in need. True, we’ve seen more of them since Father Emmanuel joined us, but if God sends them to us, why should we fear them?”

Despite needing the priests’ help, Dean can’t hold back his scoff at that. Ryan’s smile softens without disappearing.

“I take it you’re not a man of faith?”

“It’s... complicated,” says Dean, which is part hedging to avoid offense but mostly depressingly true. How can he tell a priest that God is real but a coward, angels are dicks, and his best friend ate a bunch of monster souls, declared himself the new God, then went crazy and exploded? Complicated is the least of it.

Just like the omission of Dean’s name, Ryan takes that in stride. His tone stays easily conversational as he resumes the walk to the rectory. “It often is. But by coming here, you’ve already taken the first step towards trusting yourself to God’s hands.”

Dean thinks, but doesn’t say, that he’s a lot more interested in what Emmanuel’s hands can do.

The kitchen Ryan leads him into is modest and uninhabited. Water runs in the near distance, the steady, scattered drops of a shower. The elusive Emmanuel, unless there’s more of them nearby. He looks around, but doesn’t spot any clues. No photos, no dirty dishes in the sink or coats hanging by the door, and he can’t see enough down the hallway to tell what’s a bedroom and what isn’t, never mind whether they’re singles or doubles.

After setting a kettle to boil on the stove, Ryan disappears down that narrow hallway. Dean hears a knock, then the creak of a door and voices, low and indistinct, before Ryan comes back into the kitchen. The shower hasn’t stopped.

“He’ll be out in just a moment.”

“Right,” says Dean. “Thanks.”

The silence after that feels awkward, heavy and thick in Dean’s lungs as he breathes it in, but Ryan doesn’t seem to mind. There’s an easy relaxation to his shoulders as he sets up a mug with a plastic cone of a coffee filter on top, the kind that used to be in every half-assed motel the Winchesters stayed in. These days, they mostly have electric coffee pots. The small and cheap kind, but still generally considered a step or two above what Dean grew up with.

It’s nice to see the old, familiar style of a drip cone again. The uneasy tension in Dean’s chest settles as he watches Ryan spoon coffee grounds into the filter. Waiting for the kettle to boil is less of a chore, after that, especially when Ryan apologizes again for keeping him waiting. Dean turns down cream and sugar, taking the hot mug from Ryan just as the bathroom door opens and soft footsteps move towards them down the hall.

The coffee smells amazing, stronger and richer than the gas station sludge he’s used to, but Dean’s appreciative sip turns into a scalding, too-large gulp when the priest he’s waiting for comes through the doorway. Because unless Jimmy Novak had a twin no one thought to mention to him, there’s a dead angel standing in front of him, face creased with warm welcome and no recognition at all.

He’s wearing navy blue pajamas with white hems, has his feet stuffed into dark, fluffy slippers. His hair droops against his forehead, still damp from the shower, and all Dean can think is that it makes sense, that it should be wet, because Cas dissolved into dirty water and Leviathan goo right in front of him.

Misreading Dean’s disbelieving gape, he looks down at himself with an apologetic grimace. “It’s all I had with me, and I didn’t want to make you wait any longer,” he says with Cas’s voice.

It’s different than Jimmy’s had been, when he was briefly unchained from his comet. Maybe it’s something about the shattering cacophony of Cas’s true voice being forced through human vocal cords, Dean’s never really been sure, but there’s a depth to it that he doesn’t think a mere mortal could achieve.

Cas says, “I’m Emmanuel. And you are?”

*

Cas doesn’t remember him. Cas doesn’t remember anything, thinks his name is Emmanuel, thinks he’s a human priest with miraculous powers granted by God. Dean lies in the bed he was almost aggressively ushered off to and stares at the unblemished plaster ceiling, trying to decide if it’s better or worse than when Cas thought he was God.

He didn’t get the whole story, but he’s put together enough to know that someone higher up in the the church than Ryan found Cas with no memories and healing powers that he didn’t know came from being an angel, and they took advantage. They put him in a dog collar that they claimed he’d earned years ago, then sent him to St. Mary’s and called it a transfer to help him recover after the miraculous accident that had traded his memories for God’s blessing.

He seems happy, but Dean hates that they lied to him and used his vulnerability against him. He hates that he’s doing it, too, because he’s going to bring Cas to Sam and not tell him the truth until it’s done. He wasn’t sure until just now, but as soon as he has the thought, he knows it’s true.

He’s not going to shatter Cas’s illusion.

It’s not like he’d even know where to start. Seems like Cas bought into the God crap pretty easily, but actual supernatural crap up to and including ‘you’re an angel, Castiel,’ would be a hell of a lot harder to swallow. There’s just too many years, too much bullshit for him to get through when Sam’s waiting for them.

If Cas were himself, he might flap them right over, but getting Cas back to himself isn’t a sure thing. Going back to the Leviathan madness would be so much worse than a clueless but well-meaning priest.

He can’t take that risk, or the risk that it would take too long, that Cas would balk at the truth, that he’d refuse if he knew, that he’d—there’s just too much shit that can go wrong.

He’ll tell Cas. Just... later.

When Sam’s better. When there’s maybe one less fucking disaster looming. When it’ll be helpful to have Cas-the-angel, because maybe he could shed some light on what the hell they’re supposed to do with the Leviathan. Right now he just needs a miracle, and if his miracle needs to think he’s named Emmanuel to function, Dean’ll give him that.

He’s been awake since ass o’clock between the search for Sam and the search for an answer for Sam. Not as long as Sam has, because Sam is a few fruits shy of a loop and Dean’s trying to keep his shit together as best he can under the circumstances. And that means getting his four solid hours so he can drive Cas—Cas Emmanuel, Cas the human, Cas whose fault this is—back to Indiana to set things right.

Exhausted, he lets the sweetly scented sheets carry him to troubled sleep.

*

_A gray room. Blood on the walls. It drips down, turns black in the gray light of the gray room. Cas is there, gray and red and black, black from his hair, black from his eyes, black when he opens his mouth. It flows out, out, pouring into the room and filling it like it fills him. Blue eyes glint black, wide grin stretches around the fountain of ichor. Cas drowns in it and his eyes never leave Dean._

He doesn’t remember the dream when he wakes, but the bathroom feels too small and dark. Even the cold, clear water that streams from the faucet makes him shudder before he collects himself and washes his face.

*

Ryan isn’t keen on Cas, or Emmanuel, taking off with a stranger. The argument that started last night picks up again over a breakfast of oatmeal that Dean only sits down for because his initial refusal made Cas frown sadly and he can’t afford to offend him right now.

So kid gloves it is. For the amnesiac multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent.

“We can request an escort from the diocese,” Ryan says. “You shouldn’t go alone.”

It’s the first time he’s indicated any mistrust of Dean, and it’s a little late—they let him sleep a few feet away from their rooms just hours after meeting him—but Dean would call it a good thing if it weren’t currently obstructing his plans. If Ryan could just wait about two days before suddenly deciding to get appropriately paranoid, that would be great.

“I’ll make sure he gets back to you in one piece.”

The lie’s easy, like the handful of others he’s told Ryan. He still feels a twinge of guilt, though, because Ryan seems like a decent guy and he’s genuinely concerned about Cas’s false persona. He doesn’t know the truth of Cas’s life any more than Cas does, he’s just trying to take care of a vulnerable man. Maybe, once everything’s sorted out, Cas can give him a call and feed him a line about—fuck only knows what. They’ll figure it out when they get to it, or Dean will, because Cas still doesn’t have the hang of lying convincingly.

Then Dean remembers how they got here, Crowley and Purgatory and all of it, and thinks maybe Cas has lying down after all.

He’s angry. He’s pissed. It’s the kind of simmering rage that’s only going to get worse as he dwells on it, hard to keep under control and even harder to explain. Just the idea of trying to explain it to Cas’s innocent, ignorant face without punching it sours the bile in the pit of his stomach, and he has to excuse himself before it gets any worse.

He pretends to check the time, grits out, “Sorry, I need to call the hospital real quick,” through a twitch of a forced smile that probably doesn’t look any better than the grimace it really is, but hopefully they’ll accept it as worry. Ryan and Cas start talking softly as soon as he’s away from the table, but as far as he can tell it’s not about him.

Dr. Kadinsky takes his call directly. There’s enough of a delay before he gets to the phone that Dean suspects they dragged him away from a patient. He doesn’t know if that’s a good sign or not. But the doctor sounds mildly enthusiastic as he says, “Dean, I’m so glad you called.”

“Yeah? You got news?”

“I do,” Kadinsky says. “Good news,” he says.

Dean can’t follow it all, a long string of words where he hears “microsleeps” and “REM” and “anesthesia” but doesn’t know what they all mean together. Then Kadinsky pulls out “extremely abnormal brain scans” and Dean has to stop him because,

“That sure as hell doesn’t sound like any good news I’ve ever heard.”

“No, it is. I’m sorry, I must have lost you somewhere. It’s much easier to do this in person.” He can hear Kadinsky’s frown. “As you know, Sam wasn’t responding to sedation, so we brought in an anesthesiologist. General anesthesia isn’t anything like sleep, but sometimes it can provide a, a reset, if you will. An opportunity for REM rebound. Brain activity more or less shuts down—it should, anyway. Instead, your brother’s EEG is showing patterns consistent with REM sleep while he’s under.

“It’s. Well, it should be impossible, Mr. Smith. We’re going to keep him under for as long as we safely can, monitored of course, then see how he’s doing after he comes out. It’s not a solution, not by a long shot, but it buys us time.”

Nothing will really make Dean feel better until he has Sam back, but the news is enough to pull him back to the priests’ kitchen. Both men look up at him, Ryan with a tired and resigned smile and Cas with the sort of tranquil purpose that Dean hasn’t seen since... It’s hard to remember when. The barn, maybe.

It’s even enough to make him push his luck a little.

“Decided I’m safe enough?”

“That was never in question,” Cas tells him with a gentle smile. “The Lord brought you to me and I trust Him with my safety. I’m meant to go with you, to help your brother. I can feel it.”

Ryan looks less convinced. Dean refrains from rolling his eyes at Cas’s naive faith, which is more blind than it ever was even when he was an angelic tool, as Ryan says, “We can trust the Lord and still take reasonable precautions, Emmanuel.”

That seems pretty rich from a guy who, again, welcomed Dean into his home in the middle of the night without knowing his name. But apparently Cas was right and it’s not about Dean being a potential serial killer at all.

“You should have someone who can look after your spiritual well-being. The price you pay for your gift—”

“Is little, compared to the reward.”

Cas reaches across the table to take Ryan’s hand in both of his. All at once, as Cas fixes Ryan with an all-too-familiar intent look, Dean feels painfully out of place. An intruder in the lives of two devout men, never mind that one of them is five kinds of lies. Cas doesn’t know that; to him, in this moment, Ryan is his closest friend. His family, his brother.

The queasy feeling isn’t jealousy. No matter what Dean said, what he thought, Cas clearly hadn’t thought of himself as a Winchester, as Dean and Sam’s family. What he did to Sam—then again, considering what he did to his Heavenly family, maybe that’s not a good indication. Maybe he doesn’t really know how to have a family that’s not some kind of dysfunctional.

Not like Dean doesn’t know what that’s like.

What Cas has here, it might be a good life for him. But they don’t get good lives. Dean’s gonna drive him away from it, then he’s gonna tear it away from him. It might be a little bit spiteful, because he’s still sparking mad that Cas thought leaving Dean in peace with Lisa and shacking up with Crowley instead was the right call, thought lying to him about Sam and goddamn breaking Sam to get his way was justified. So yeah, Dean doesn’t feel too bad showing him how it should’ve gone.

“Ryan,” Cas says. Dean has to fight a wince at the warm tone and doesn’t want to think about why. “I know you’re worried, and I thank you for your concern. You’ve been such a blessing to me since I came here. I’m not denying that it’s—difficult, sometimes. But this is something I have to do. The sense that I need to go with Dean, it’s the strongest pull I’ve ever felt towards a healing. That must mean something.”

Dean’s pretty sure it means bleed-over, Cas’s real memories buried somewhere and leaking just enough for him to have a ‘feeling’ about Dean. It sure as shit ain’t God nudging Cas in his direction.

***

Emmanuel’s belongings are few. Two cassocks, a black tab collar clergy shirt and matching slacks, socks and undergarments. He prefers the cassock to street clothes or the shirt and pants. Though Ryan jokingly calls him old fashioned for it, it feels reassuringly familiar. When he asked, Bishop Cooper confirmed that had been his taste before the accident, too.

He also has his pajamas and slippers, a minor indulgence left over from his days staying with the bishop. Bishop Cooper had offered him other comforts, an allowance for his recovery, but if he hadn’t needed them before, he knew he could be satisfied without them again.

All told, he’s packed a few minutes after breakfast.

Dean and Ryan wait in the kitchen, each staring into his own coffee without conversation, and both stand when he comes in from the hall. While Dean looks purposefully at the door, quietly impatient to get them on the way to his ailing brother, Ryan offers him a fraternal embrace.

“You’ll call,” he insists as he steps back, “if it ever gets to be too much. If you need to talk.”

Emmanuel promises, “I will. I’ll return as soon as I can.”

Dean’s car is parked just before the main doors, and he takes Emmanuel’s bag with a tight smile to stow in the trunk. As they pull out of the parking lot, Ryan waving after them, Dean says, “You two seem close.”

There’s an edge of accusation underneath Dean’s mild tone, but Emmanuel doesn’t know why. The cause could be the same anxiety that’s been driving Dean’s gruffness all morning, plastered behind an admirable veneer of politeness, or perhaps he’s suggesting that they’re inappropriately intimate. The claim has been raised once before, by a fifth grader petulant at being caught out cheating on a math test, but it’s untrue.

As far as he knows, he’s never been intimate at all. Admittedly, as far as he knows isn’t particularly far—eight months, give or take, that he has any memory of, and a few bits of information that Bishop Cooper was able to provide. But he assumes he’s been celibate since seminary; before that, it’s harder to know.

Before he can answer, Dean clears his throat and adds, “It’s good. That he’s looking out for you. Sounds like you could use it, though I don’t quite understand what he’s worried about.”

It offers as good an opportunity as any for Emmanuel to explain. Dean will need to know, after all. When Emmanuel heals his brother at the latest, but more likely it will present an issue before then, so he should prepare Dean for the worst.

“When I heal someone, it’s not really me doing the healing. I’m a conduit for God’s will. Being permitted to channel that power is... astounding. An indescribable blessing. But it exhausts me, and leaves me vulnerable to less benevolent forces.

“I’m often unwell, after.”

Black sickness crawls up his veins in the moments after he’s passed on God’s miracle, like he’s cleansing sins instead of ailments, pulling them into himself to unburden his parishioners’ souls. Evil whispers in his ear, sometimes for minutes, sometimes hours. Demons, Satan himself, he's not really sure; at times there’s only a single voice, but often more than one, speaking in chorus or arguing over each other. They want to consume the world, they want to grow inside him, they want him to join them—it’s confusing and deeply disturbing, and he shuts it out as best he can.

To his left, Dean clenches his jaw and glares straight ahead out the windshield. Ryan told him Dean was a non-believer, but to Emmanuel he looks more determined than dubious. “Unwell how?”

“Dark thoughts. Evil trying to tempt my heart away from the Lord. I can overcome them, but it takes time and I’m sometimes... not myself during the struggle.”

After his most recent healing, visiting a young single mother whose untimely cataracts left her jobless and terrified, he’d spent three minutes sitting on the floor, staring vacantly at a withered houseplant and moving his lips without speaking. So Ryan told him, at least. He has no memory of the actions, only of two distinct but equally raspy voices explaining in cruel, patient tones that he was empty inside but they could fill him to the brim.

Emmanuel pushes the moment away, silently reciting the Lord’s Prayer to clear his mind. He doesn’t like to give the troubling thoughts any more of his attention than he must. He will not give them power over him.

Face grim, Dean opens his mouth but then closes it again without speaking.”All right,” he says finally, and they keep driving east.

*

The pull hits him a few hours into their drive. It’s not quite a vision, more of an impression than actually seeing the woman kneeling before an altar, crossing herself and asking God for a miracle. He hasn’t been to this part of Montana, not that he can remember, but he instinctively knows where she is and how to reach her. It’s always like that, when he’s sent to help someone.

Sometimes, like with Dean, those in need of help find him. It’s grown more frequent as word of his gift has spread, people actively seeking him out. But mostly he’s sent where he’s needed by flashes like this, God or His angels guiding him directly to the person he’s meant to heal.

Emmanuel expects pushback when he has to break the news to Dean of their detour. He understands. Dean is worried for his brother Sam’s life. He may remember less than a year of his life, but even that has been enough to know the lengths to which people will go for their loved ones.

He wonders if anyone would do the same for him. It’s been days since he last acted as a conduit for the Divine miracle, so there are no demons whispering in the dark reaches of his mind that no one ever would. Even without them, he doesn’t think there is anyone. Even Ryan, who is his friend and has looked after him since he moved to St. Mary’s, must consider the parish before he worries for Emmanuel.

Dismissing that line of thinking, avarice when he’s already been blessed in so many other ways, he focuses on the task at hand.

“Dean.”

“Yeah—Uh. Yes, Father?”

“I’ve received Divine inspiration.”

As he anticipated Dean shoots him a sideways glance. “You what now?” He sounds more wary than confused.

Emmanuel hopes, for Dean’s own sake, that he will be more willing to accept the truth of God’s grace after witnessing the miracle of a healing firsthand. It must be so tiring to live without faith, always doubting the goodness of the world. He finds it difficult enough when the madness of evil inches nihilistically into his thoughts during his weakest moments. Not being able to trust in a loving God would make those times unbearable.

“Guidance,” he clarifies. “There’s a soul nearby in need of help.”

Dean’s face sours. “There’s a soul not nearby in need of help, too, and he’s first in line.”

“I know. I’m not turning my back on him, or on you, Dean. But I can’t ignore the call. It’s a sign from God of how He wants me to use His gift. If I disregard that, if I’m not humble and grateful for the blessing of being able to do what I’m able to do, I could lose it. Rightfully so. And then where would that leave your brother?”

It’s an oversimplification of the duty he owes, but one he thinks will resonate with Dean as a layman.

“It will only take a few hours,” he adds. “I can tell you where to go.”

*

They pull up to a pale yellow house. Tulips and birdbaths pop up across the yard, and colorfully painted birdhouses hang from nearly every branch of the lone cherry tree. It should be lovely in the late morning light, except for the sense of anguished desperation that emanates from within. The birds seem able to feel it, too, and do not flock to the generous amenities offered for them. Once he accomplishes his mission, the house will be lovely and inviting again.

He tells Dean he can stay in the car if he’s uncomfortable. He’d like him to come, to witness the miracle and perhaps gain some faith by it, but Dean still looks put out about the stop and he’ll have the opportunity to see for himself once they reach Sam. Until then, Emmanuel wants this to be as easy as possible on him. It’s a protectiveness he’s used to feeling towards those he can heal, but Sam is an abstract concept to him. Logically, of course he wants to help him, but it’s not the visceral pull he feels when he’s been sent to someone’s side. Not to Sam, at least.

Dean is the one who came to him, and Sam is more than a thousand miles distant. It makes sense for him to be more strongly connected to Dean for now.

Despite Emmanuel’s offer, Dean gets out of the car with him. “Promised Father Ryan I’d look out for you,” he says. His shoulders haven’t lost their stiffness, but he smiles and it eases the tension in Emmanuel’s own spine.

The woman he’s here for opens her door as they approach. Beneath the pallor of her drawn face and the red staining her eyes, he sees a beautiful soul shining through. A peaceful and gentle woman, a lover of animals—in addition to the welcoming environment she’s created in her yard, there’s a large gray tabby winding about her legs. Just through the open door, he sees a crucifix in a place of honor in the entry hall; she holds a rosary in trembling hands.

Whatever ails her, and he’ll know soon enough what that is, it hasn’t lessened her devotion. She turned to God and God sent him.

When Emmanuel tells her why he’s come, she falls to her knees and weeps. He follows her down, lets her cling to him and sob out praise and thanks. He’s never sure how to react when this happens, overwhelmed by empathy and with nothing but his own faith to offer back. Sometimes it’s enough. This time, this person, she’s comforted by it, but doesn’t let go. He could do it here, now, but neither her joy nor God’s direction can substitute for consent. He won’t lay hands on her without her approval.

Surprisingly, it’s Dean who guides them up. Gently; patiently. A man more used to the distressed than Emmanuel is, in his current state of being.

“Come on,” he urges softly, “inside. That’s better, out of the street. There you go.”

He gets her settled in a quaint living room, only looking back once to check that Emmanuel is behind them. Dean sits next to her on the floral-patterned couch and makes a face that she can’t see, but Emmanuel can, when her cat jumps up into her lap. The cat stares back at Dean, unimpressed and unblinking, as the woman sinks her fingers into its fur to soothe herself.

Dean looks at Emmanuel and nods meaningfully to the wooden chair nearest their hostess. The guidance feels familiar, though it’s more overt than Ryan’s assistance when he’s present for one of Emmanuel’s healings. Emmanuel doesn’t remember all the hymns and prayers he ought to, though he’s been relearning them, so Ryan helps where he falters. He’s good at working around Emmanuel’s edges—everyone’s edges, as he needs to, and it’s a quality Emmanuel aspires to emulate in his calling.

Less subtle, Dean clears his throat and raises his eyebrows as Emmanuel sits. It’s a sufficient reminder.

“My name is Emmanuel,” he says; should have said sooner. “Will you let me help you?”

She gathers herself. Her name is Clarice and she lives alone, aside from the old cat that keeps hissing at Dean. Dean curls his lip back at it, but Clarice doesn’t notice, too caught up in telling Emmanuel her story. A newly discovered aneurysm, large and inoperable. It could burst at any moment, or she could have years ahead of her. There’s no way to know, and the uncertainty troubles her even more than her powerlessness.

“You can really...” Clarice trails off and her eyes leave him for a small canvas depicting the Virgin Mary, gold radiating a halo around her. “Thank you,” she whispers; not to him. To him, then, “Do I need to do anything?”

Standing, taking the few steps to her side, he looks down and tells her, “Try to relax. This may feel... odd. It shouldn’t hurt.”

Raising his hand with two fingers outstretched, he reaches out until he’s barely brushing the skin of her forehead. Despite the lightness of the contact, or maybe because of it, she flinches away. With a sniff and a soft apology, she closes her eyes and leans into his touch. Her knuckles are white against the dark gray fur of her cat.

Channeling the Divine for a healing takes little effort on his part. The power flows through him naturally, like it belongs there, rushing heat and light from his heart out through his arm. He doesn’t have to think to direct it into Clarice; it knows where it needs to go. There’s nothing to see at first, no flash of encircling light to echo the Holy Mother’s, but Emmanuel nonetheless imagines he can feel it pushing into Clarice, sweeping along through her brain and repairing the damage. It washes away the blood, strengthens weakened tissues, clears away the ticking timebomb of the aneurysm and of the early onset dementia she didn’t know was lurking. She doesn’t have to know; she’ll be safe now.

It’s the aftermath that gets him. Even as he says, “It’s done,” and draws his hand away, a sick feeling blooms in the veins of his fingers and races up into him, lashing back along the path the miracle flowed out. He’s empty but it fills him, bloats like infection until there’s nothing good left inside. He’s decay, hunger never satisfied by what it devours, seeking out more to consume, to taint, more and more and—

It grabs his arm, the weak thing of soft flesh, asks, “Will you pray with me?”

He comes back to himself enough to ignore the terrible urge to tear into Clarice’s skull, fill it back up with blood. Shaking her off because he can’t stand the crawling of his skin that originates under her hand, he stumbles back. One step, then two, then his leg hits something and his jerk is enough to have him falling. He lands hard on the carpet, catching himself on both knees but only one hand, because his right still aches and pulses with wrongness.

“Father Emmanuel?” Clarice’s voice is scared again and too, too close. He doesn’t want her there.

His throat cracks in half around a single word, “Don’t,” and he can’t say any more.

From beside him, more welcome in the space than Clarice, Dean says, “I’m here. You’re gonna be okay, come on.”

The reassurance settles him, somewhat. It doesn’t silence the hatred trying to climb out of his viscera, but it helps him swallow it down so it can only poison him. He wants to leave this house, which can now be lovely again, untainted by the black bile.

As he concentrates on fighting back the vicious voices creeping up his spine, Dean makes excuses for him—he doesn’t process what’s being said, he just knows that Clarice isn’t in his space anymore and Dean’s leading him away, one hand under his good arm and the other pressed to his back. Clean, crisp air hits him before they’re even outside, following the swing of the door inside the hallway, and it clears his head and turns his stomach simultaneously.

Only a few steps out of the house, he falls to his knees and vomits. Thick black gunk clings to his throat on the way up, drips globs onto the cheery tulips when he gags and coughs.

“Fuck,” says Dean.

*

Emmanuel expects they’ll continue onward to Sam, but Dean pulls off the interstate almost as soon as he gets back on it, into a motel parking lot that’s more pothole than gravel. He’s slumped against the window, trying to fight down the intrusive gloom in his soul, but he pushes himself upright when Dean parks in front of the office. His right arm tingles in protest at the movement.

“If you’re stopping for my sake,” he starts, but has to cough at the residual gunk making his throat feel full and sticky.

“Yeah, I am, and don’t bother arguing. You can stay here, I’m just getting us a room.”

Emmanuel extracts himself from the car anyway and hope it doesn’t count as arguing to admit, “I’d prefer not to be alone, if that’s all right.”

Dean gives him an appraising once-over. He feels half hollow and can’t look much better, because Dean grimaces before nodding. “Okay, yeah. On second thought, I’m not sure I want to leave you alone, either. Come on.”

“I’m sorry,” says Emmanuel as he follows Dean to the office door. “I know this is more of a delay, when you’re already anxious about getting to Sam.”

It’s still obeying Dean’s direction not to argue, and guilt aside, he’s glad not to. Because here he can wash himself off, clean the grime of the day from his body and soul. His demons, currently reminding him how weak he is, how selfish, they quiet beneath the water. Like a baptism, a cold shower can wash them clean. He’d like a hot shower, too, once that’s done.

Dean stops with his hand on the door. “I don’t want to kill you in the process. It’d be pretty shitty to hurt someone who wants to help you, just to get your way.”

Emmanuel’s agreement earns a bitter-sounding snort from Dean, but he pulls open the door and walks into the motel lobby without offering an explanation. Inside, Dean requests a single room with two queen beds like it’s second nature. He still seems standoffish about something as they go to the assigned room. Emmanuel doesn’t know how it could be his fault, but his inner turmoil insists it is, so he doesn’t force conversation. He can evaluate the truth of that when he’s able to look at it objectively.

“Lemme hit the head, then the shower’s all yours.” Dean shuts the bathroom door before Emmanuel can respond, leaving him alone with his thoughts after all. It may or may not be all he deserves, depending on whose opinions he listens to.

Dean’s back before he can spiral down too far, then Emmanuel’s out of his clothes and stepping into the cold spray. The thick, dark sickness clogging up his veins washes down the drain; he’s not sure if he can see it or if that’s just a trick of the questionable lighting. It’s never been visible before, but that doesn’t mean anything. His symptoms are getting worse each time, the demons winning a stronger grip on his soul, so this may be the next progression.

He noticed a few weeks ago, but hasn’t told Ryan yet. For the time being, his faith is still strong enough to keep them at bay. He can hold out, help a few more people before he has to turn to Ryan for—guidance, penance, an exorcism, he’s not sure what form it will take. What he does know is that Ryan takes his responsibility for Emmanuel’s safety, as charged by the bishop, seriously. Emmanuel isn’t ready to stop using the blessing God has given him. Job suffered more greatly and to less purpose; he can withstand this trial.

That thought may be blasphemous, or at least prideful. He doesn’t dwell on it past his resolve to do better; do more.

Changing into his pajamas, he leaves the bathroom to find Dean on the phone, pacing. “—gonna be a bit longer than I thought before I can get back, is all. But I found...” His eyes dark to Emmanuel, then away. “I’m bringing help. So hang in there, okay?”

“Your brother?” Emmanuel asks once Dean hangs up moments later, nothing else said.

“Yeah. Don’t know why I bother, not like he has any fucking clue what I’m saying.”

“I’m sure he still finds it reassuring to hear your voice.”

Dean is not one of those on whom Emmanuel’s paltry consolations work. He shrugs the words off with an irritated, “Whatever,” and retreats to the bathroom.

Emmanuel’s alone again, but this time he’s truly alone, so it’s not so bad. He’s himself, wholly. He gets comfortable in the bed not claimed by Dean’s duffle bag, bones heavy with exhaustion.

Demonic backlash notwithstanding, the day has gone well. He got to assist the Lord in saving a good woman, and Dean witnessed the miracle. That feels significant for reasons he can’t immediately identify. Yes, he hopes it will inspire Dean’s faith, but there’s more to it than that. A personal aspect, the need for Dean, specifically, to approve of him, specifically. It should be a ridiculous notion—he only met the man last night. Perhaps it’s because Dean is placing so much trust in him, undertaking such a journey to get Emmanuel to his brother.

He reconsiders this logic when Dean appears with a towel wrapped around his waist to rummage through his things. “Forgot a change of clothes,” he explains when he catches Emmanuel looking. He sounds less troubled, relaxed by his shower just as Emmanuel was.

As he watches Dean’s bare back vanish behind the closing door, an entirely new thought occurs to him. He’s never considered before, when pondering his life prior to the accident, that he might be homosexual. Ryan never sparked his interest, nor any of the men of his parish. Neither did the women, and he was passingly pleased to be free of that particular temptation. But the sight of Dean’s body inspires—longing, if not lust. A profound desire for something he can’t quite name.

For the first time, he wonders if he joined the church just to serve his devotion, or if it was also to avoid sin through vowed celibacy.

Dressed for bed, Dean emerges into the room. Now that Emmanuel’s aware of his desire, the increased modesty of Dean’s sleeping clothes does little to abate it.

Fortunately, Dean doesn’t seem to notice. All he asks is, “You, uh. You sleep all right, usually?”

“I do suffer from insomnia at times. But healings are draining enough that it’s not going to be a problem today.”

“Draining,” Dean repeats with a grimace. Emmanuel supposes it is something of an understatement for what Dean’s witnessed thus far.

***

Dean can’t stop stealing glances at Cas on the next day’s drive. He’s subdued; exhausted, apparently, bags under his eyes that shouldn’t be there. Hungry, too. Dean plans to drive straight through the day to try and catch up some of the time they lost to Clarice, but Cas’s stomach makes an audible complaint in the early afternoon.

“Eat a lot after a healing?” he asks, trying to keep his voice casual as he pulls into the first half-assed roadside restaurant he sees. It looks even sketchier than the places he deliberately picks to mess with Sam, but the faded decal in the window says “Burgers” and that’ll have to do.

Cas’s tentative agreement, accompanied by a sheepish half-smile that almost—but only almost—looks familiar on his features, sounds like bad news for Sam. Because an angel who needs to eat and sleep isn’t exactly the kind of soul-curing powerhouse Dean came looking for. Eating and sleeping angels: kind of useless. Cas has healed more than one person, though, sounds like he’s been doing it for months, so hopefully it’s just a temporary thing. Maybe the naps and burgers will help him replenish it faster.

Even more worrying than Cas’s apparently fading grace is what happens to him when he uses it. And it’s not like Dean’s an idiot, he knows it’s a problem that’s gonna have to be addressed. Just like Cas’s real identity. As part of Cas’s real identity, probably, since it’s angelic shit going wrong. But that’s not news, because angels fucking shit up is more certain than death or taxes, both of which Dean has avoided to one degree or another.

So it can wait. All of it can wait until after Sammy. That’s the mantra that’s guided him through the last twenty-four hours, and it’ll see him to Indiana. Everything else comes second to getting his brother fixed.

After they’re shown to a table by a kid who doesn’t know what to do with himself at the sight of a real, live Catholic priest in this shitty truckstop diner, Dean stands.

“Get as much of whatever as you want,” he tells Cas. “Gotta get your strength back up.”

Then he heads for the bathroom. Anger heats his head again and he needs to calm down before Cas picks up on it. He’s already playing with fire here, outbursts of rage that he can’t explain will only make things worse.

It’s just that he’s so fucking furious at Cas every time he remembers. The amnesia only makes it worse, especially yesterday when he had to listen to Cas condemning his own unremembered actions. Dean shouldn’t have prompted it. He thought he’d feel better, vindicated, but instead it just left him wondering what the hell had gone wrong to change Cas’s views so drastically.

Their waiter has come and gone when Dean gets back to the table, but Dean flags him down and orders a cheeseburger.

“Another one?” the kid, Mason by his nametag, asks with a surprised glance at Cas. No wonder, since three of them arrive when their food comes out, and a basket of chicken strips, too.

Misreading Dean’s stare, Cas says, “I can pay for it, of course. For yours, too—I owe you for the room last night.”

“Nah. I’m just, uh, impressed.” Dean waves a hand over the array of plates. “And don’t worry about the motel. I’m the one dragging you across six states, I can put you up.”

The parish shouldn’t have to pay, even if Dean hasn’t forgiven them for basically Stockholming Cas. And it’s not like it really costs Dean anything.

Cas finishes his first burger before Dean’s even done, then takes a break to drain his water glass.

It’s weird, the things that are the same about him. Cheeseburgers: obviously still a thing. So’s the awkwardness, the noticeable confusion when dealing with anyone trying to have a normal social interaction with him. Dean’s pretty sure it means those things, what remains when he’s stripped of his memories and context, are just part of Cas’s basic nature.

But that means his faith is, too. It seems just as steadfast now as it was when Dean tried to stab him in the barn. It’s more than just his healing ability that he credits God for, or the lies he’s been fed about his calling. Dean can tell that just from the short amount of time he’s spent with this version of Cas. The way he talks about his beliefs, he doesn’t have any doubts.

His unshakeable faith that Dean shook once before, and look where that got them.

The rest of his burger tastes like tar, but he forces it down.

*

Dean stops them for the night just outside of Fargo. He could make it a few more hours, probably, but they’re about halfway back to northern Indiana and Cas is fading, trying not to nod off against his window. If he needs food and sleep to recover his grace, well, Dean’s gonna give it to him. They can make it to the hospital as soon as tomorrow night if they push, and he wants Cas ready to do his thing when they get there.

The anesthetic plan is working, according to Dean’s last call to Dr. Kadinsky. Sam’s the same, stable. Not worse, but not doing any better—so still off his nut. Knowing Dean’s luck and Sam’s penchant for rambling, having to wait would lead to Sam saying something to or about Cas that would blow up the whole identity thing and ruin Dean’s resolution to get Sam dealt with before dealing with Cas. A little delay in the short term, when Dean needs to sleep at least a few hours anyway, is worth it to avoid that risk.

The motel he finds looks nicer than the last one from the outside, but their room has a stain on the carpet the size and color of someone’s stomach contents; not the smell, fortunately. In the bathroom, the fan’s busted and the dated beige wallpaper’s peeling from the moisture.

Cas stands over the stain with his head cocked to the side, studying it. Another habit untouched by the amnesia.

“I’ll see if they can move us,” Dean offers, but Cas declines.

“Unless it bothers you, then of course. But I’m—fascinated, actually,” he says. “Before last night, the only places I’d slept were Bishop Cooper’s guest room and my room at St. Mary’s. This is a new experience for me, as far as I can recall. I appreciate my good fortune, of course, but not everyone can live in such good conditions, even to the modest standard of living Ryan and I enjoy.

“My missing life experience makes it more difficult for me to relate to my parishioners, so it’s good to expand my horizons.”

So far, Cas hasn’t said much about his past—or lack of one. The few times, like now, he doesn’t sound as upset about it as Dean thinks he would be in the same situation. Not even curious or speculative about his life before. It infuriates Dean, when he lets it. How easily Cas accepted this too-convenient priest bullshit.

How easily Cas forgot him and Sam, isn’t even trying to get him back. So much for a profound bond. Even though he doesn’t really want Cas remembering right now, it hurts for reasons Dean’s even less willing to deal with at the moment than Cas’s issues. So he shoves them down and focuses on the slightly safer anger, then focuses on setting the anger aside. It’s no good until he can safely confront Cas about it.

Just like he has to be cautious answering Cas’s questions about Sam. He doesn’t want to say the wrong thing and shake loose a memory, but he can only be so evasive. At least Cas accepts the excuse that Dean’s too worried about Sam to want to talk about him, which isn’t even much of a lie.

After that revelation, Cas took it upon himself to try and cheer Dean up. He’s not particularly good at it, so he mostly commented on Dean’s tapes and narrated the interesting freeway signs they passed. Dude still has a weird definition of interesting.

It kept Dean entertained, though, enough that he didn’t spend the whole drive pissed about pretty much everything currently happening in his life. The way Cas quietly lit up when he got a laugh out of Dean is enough like old times to give Dean the first faint stirrings of hope that he’s felt in a while. They’ll figure it out, then they’ll have it out—because Cas isn’t getting out of this without a complete understanding of exactly how much he’s fucked up—then they’ll get back to normal. Family.

Except Bobby.

Who’s dead because of Cas’s power grab.

Pleasantly hopeful mood shattered, Dean hits the shower. A lifetime of sharing single rooms has trained him on the best ways to get away when he can’t actually leave, and he doesn’t feel like pacing around the parking lot. The bathroom is less effective than usual as an escape route when he has to leave the door open to keep it from turning into a swamp, but it works.

When he shuts off the water and shoves the curtain aside, he catches Cas’s head whipping around to the television, which is turned off. Dean wasn’t in there very long, but either Cas feels gross or he just really likes showers, because he rushes into the bathroom impatiently as soon as Dean vacates it. He shuts the door.

*

He wakes too few hours later to Cas failing to sneak out of the room. He’s bumping around in the dark way too much to avoid waking Dean. Fumbling until he finds the pull chain, Dean turns on his nightstand lamp by his head and blinks against the brightness to find Cas already changed into a priest’s robe. He locates the shoe he’d been looking for and sits on the bed to tie it. The hem of his outfit catches on his foot when he lifts it to rest on his knee to reach the laces; his legs are bare underneath.

“What’s up—” He almost slips, tired and distracted, but he manages to cut the name off before it escapes. The half-formed question hangs in the air as Dean sits up.

“I’m needed at a hospital,” Cas says. “It’s nearby, I can walk. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

Stifling a yawn behind a frown, Dean swings out of bed. “No, it’s fine. But are you sure you’re up for it? This last one hit you pretty hard, seems like.”

“I’m feeling much better after resting today and yesterday. But even if I weren’t, I couldn’t ignore the call.”

“Right.”

Dean rubs a hand over his face. He doesn’t need another lecture on what Cas thinks his holy responsibilities are, or whatever. Cas’s stubbornness is another trait that survived his memory loss. Couple that with the devout belief in God shit, and Dean knows better than to waste time. “Gimme a sec to change and we’ll head over.”

“You don’t need—”

Dean can be a stubborn bastard, too, especially when his family’s safety is on the line. If Cas is recovered enough to hear prayers—and Dean’s sure now that’s what it is—then he’s probably got enough grace back to heal someone. It’s what comes after that worries him.

“Yeah, but I’m gonna. You shouldn’t be alone, and I’m here, so you don’t have to be.”

Cas’s smile is so grateful it hurts. “Thank you.”

Dean’s jeans from yesterday are salvageable, but he digs out a fresh shirt to keep himself presentable. If they’re going to a hospital, it’s not just the patient who needs to be convinced to let them in. Normally a fed suit would take care of that, but he can’t pull it out under the circumstances, with Cas ignorant of all that. Hopefully a nice shirt and the company of a priest will be enough.

It is, which is the beauty of the Midwest. One of the nurses gives Dean the side-eye as he passes, but that’s the extent of the suspicion directed their way.

At least, until they get to the room. There’s a kid in the bed, looks to be sixteen or so, hooked up to all kinds of things. No one else is around, but he’s not sleeping when they go in. He turns his head to glare; his expression just gets angrier when he takes them in.

“Fuck off.”

Cas’s foot falters at the rude welcome, but he recovers and starts, “Please, let me—”

“No, I said fuck off. I don’t want to hear about God and His mysterious ways and His plans. I don’t believe in God, and if I did? I’d fucking hate Him. My life is over, so if this is His plan, He can kiss my ass.”

It reminds Dean so much of one of his own arguments with Cas, so long ago now, that he has to fight back a grin. Cas handles it better this time, not threatening to throw anyone anywhere, much less hell.

“I’m not here to tell you any of that,” Cas promises. “But I am here to help you, if you’ll let me.”

“Are you gonna make me yell for a nurse? Go away.”

The bed has a prominent call button on the railing, but he makes no move towards it. In fact, for all his agitation, the only thing he’s moved since they arrived is his head. Dean grabs his chart and flips through it for a few words he recognizes.

Keegan, who was recently paralyzed from the neck down, says, “Hey, don’t!” but he doesn’t put much effort into it. Definitely not enough to summon any of the hospital staff a few turns down the hallway. “Who are you? What the fuck do you even want?”

“To help you,” Cas repeats.

"I don’t want your help.”

“Trust me.” Dean hangs the clipboard back in its place. “You do. Father Emmanuel here can cure you. Arms and legs and, what, football career? All fixed up.”

“Bullshit.”

Dean rolls his eyes and tells Cas, “Just do your thing. He’ll thank you later.”

“Not without his permission.” Cas doesn’t move.

“What? You don’t need consent to heal someone,” Dean says, incredulous; he knows that damn well. He barely remembers to add, “Do you?” so it doesn’t sound like he’s speaking from personal experience.

Cas turns on him, eyes and voice more intense than Dean’s seen from him in priest form. “I won’t do it against his will,” he says fiercely.

That’s pretty fucking rich, Dean thinks, given how much damage Cas has caused people without needing their agreement. What he did to Sam against pretty much everyone else’s will, Sam and Dean included. But that’s another thing he can’t argue about. The list’s getting long enough to drive him crazy.

He focuses his efforts instead on Keegan, where they might be useful. “Look, I’m not with the church. Honestly, I’m not big on the whole God business, either. In fact I’m probably one of the most bitter skeptics you’ll ever meet. Way I see it, if God is around, He’s got a hell of a lot to answer for.

“But none of that is the point here. Aside from that, my friend Emmanuel, he has a—an ability.”

Finding the right way to phrase it, balancing Keegan’s sensibilities and Cas’s, isn’t easy. Keegan at least seems more inclined to listen to him than Cas, and Cas has the sense to let him take point, so it could be worse.

“God or no God, I’ve seen him work. He saved someone’s life right in front of me just yesterday. It’s why I’m here.

“My, uh. My brother is dying.” It isn’t any easier to say despite knowing he won’t let it happen. “The doctors can’t fix him. So I’m bringing Emmanuel to see him at the hospital, because he can. But he needed to stop here and see you first.”

Keegan’s not as sour-faced anymore, though he doesn’t look ready to buy what Dean’s selling, either. This argument could go forever, so Dean pulls out his final and best point.

“I know it sounds crazy, trust me. But one skeptic to another, I gotta say—what’s it hurt to try?”

He’s a scared kid. Seventeen, an athlete by the look of him. Probably dreaming of college scholarships and going pro, just to be fucked up by an accident at practice. After losing so much and being promised it all back, of course he closes his eyes and whispers, “Okay. You better not be fucking with me.”

“We’re not,” Cas answers, stepping up to his side. His fingers press against Keegan’s temple and blackness shoots up his arm in a branching, vein-like pattern. For a moment it’s the only sign that anything’s happening, but the reason it really sticks in Dean’s mind is that, despite it definitely not doing that when Cas healed Clarice, the sight is disturbingly familiar.

Before he can process that further, Keegan sits up and exclaims, “Oh my God!”

Cas’s black-stained hang grabs Keegan by the hair. “Ingrate,” he snarls.

Dean lunges for him.

“Pathetic, snivelling—”

Dean wrestles him off as he continues to spew vitriol at a wide-eyed Keegan and drags him to the door. Cas falls silent when he gets far enough away, so Dean can tell the kid, “Sorry. Sometimes he gets, you know, ‘roid ragey after. We’ll be fine. Have a, uh. Have a great fucking life. Seriously, take care of yourself.”

They make it past the nurses’ station with Cas staring darkly at Dean, allowing himself to be pulled away, but then his simmering rage explodes at Dean.

“You’re no better than he is, you worthless sack of meat.” He’s not yelling, but there’s a dangerous, venomous tone to his voice that Dean’s never heard before, and it sets his nerves on edge. “You come to me for help, yet you doubt. You see what I can do, and yet you doubt!”

He tears free of Dean’s grip and rounds on him, backing him against the wall, and gets right up in his face, so close Dean can see his darkly dilated pupils. “Are my acts not proof enough of a benevolent and attentive God? How dare you question—”

Dean feels Cas’s breath puffing angrily against his jaw and shoves him reflexively, both hands hard against Cas’s shoulders. It works in more ways than one: Cas stumbles back, giving Dean room to breathe, and blinks rapidly as his mouth closes around his next words. He shakes back into control of himself, then keeps shaking, uncontrolled, eyes wide in his pale face.

“Dean, I—I’m sorry. I don’t know what...”

Dean’s pretty sure he does know what. He just doesn’t know what to do about it.

*

Cas sleeps through the short drive back to their motel, stumbles in and out of the shower, and falls into bed to sleep more.

Even late into the morning the next day, Dean can’t wake him. He’s breathing normally—for a human, at least—and even twitches now and then like he’s dreaming. He’s just out so cold that Dean can’t make him stir more than rolling over. Refusing to just sit around and worry, Dean makes a quick trip to grab some breakfast burritos from the gas station across the street. He brings back four, eats one.

By the time the remaining three are cold and Cas still hasn’t woken, he makes a decision. Sam’s still waiting, and if Cas needs to play comatose again, he can do it just as well in the car.

He loads up their bags first, the duffle with his whole life inside so much heavier than the one with Cas’s, and his isn’t that heavy. Then he shoulders himself under one of Cas’s arms and hoists him out of bed. Cas barely reacts, letting his head fall forward and not supporting his own weight at all. Getting him to the Impala is a chore, but Dean manages it, and lays him out in the back seat. The cold burritos go next to him, within reach if he wakes. Just in case.

Then Dean drives.

For about eight hours, each time Dean checks behind him, nothing’s changed. Cas is more peaceful than most dead things he’s had the pleasure of dealing with, so unnervingly still that a couple times Dean nearly drives off the road with his eyes fixed on the rear-view, waiting to see if his chest rises with a breath. It always does.

Then he looks back to see Cas sitting straight up, staring at him in the mirror, and he swerves onto the shoulder and slams on his brakes. It earns him a honk, even on the nearly deserted night road, but he barely hears it over his own swearing.

“Jesus! Fuck, don’t do that! Shit.”

He doesn’t have a chance to calm his pounding heart. Gripping the back of Dean’s seat so hard the leather creaks, Cas leans forward and says, fast and urgent, “We have to go. He needs help.”

Caught up in adrenaline, Dean takes a beat to understand what Cas is asking for. “Are you nuts?” he snaps when he does. “You just woke up, you’ve been out all day—”

“Dean.” There’s fear in Cas’s eyes, a waver to his words. “I can hear him. He’s so young.” His hand moves from the seat to Dean’s shoulder, holding tight like it’s his only lifeline. “He’s praying for God to stop his daddy from hurting him any more.”

Dean has no defense against that, wouldn’t use it even if he did. He thinks of Sammy; thinks of Ben. He asks, “Where’re we going?”

*

Windows dark, the house looks peaceful when they approach. But standing on the porch, they can hear glass breaking and a man’s rough, angry voice. Dean knocks. It gets quiet inside, but no one answers, so he pounds on the door with the flat of his palm. It’s loud and forceful; it’s his cop knock, the kind the scumbag inside should be scared of, and he doesn’t stop until the door is wrenched open.

He’s not much to look at, middle-aged and ruddy-faced, and the air around him reeks of booze. Dean’s willing to bet that the hand behind the door is clutching a bottle of something. More important is the boy peeking out at them from around a corner. Dean can only see a small portion of the boy’s face, but what he can see is an ugly purple, swollen, with a gash still bleeding down his forehead.

Dean’s not aware of his own movement until another shattering sound brings his attention to it; he’s shoved through the door and grabbed the guy, the bastard, by his shirt to get him the fuck out of the way. “Cas, help him!”

Too late he realizes what he said, but it doesn’t matter. Cas doesn’t seem to notice the wrong name, too focused on hurrying down the path that Dean cleared for him. He stops just shy of the boy, who cowers back but doesn’t run, and kneels down to get on his level.

“My name is Emmanuel,” he says. “God sent me to help you. Do you want it to stop hurting?”

The boy answers without words, nodding and crying and throwing himself at Cas all at once. He wraps his arms around Cas’s neck and sobs into his neck and Dean has to hold the dad back as he fights to get free, yelling abuse at all three of them. The guy’s got maybe a buck on him, maybe more, but Dean’s stronger and trained to take on supernaturally strong vamps, so a pudgy drunk is no problem.

Awkward as ever, Cas slowly hugs the boy back. He rubs his up and down his spine, then whispers something to him that Dean can’t hear over the dad’s shouting. When the boy lets go and takes a step back, rubbing his sleeve over his face and spreading blood and snot in its wake, Cas reaches out and heals him.

“Are you an angel?” the boy asks, awe shining in his suddenly, perfectly clean and uninjured face.

Cas stands, turns to Dean and the dad with black spiking over his arm and crawling up his neck. “No.” He stalks towards them, the intent in his eyes as dark as the ink in his veins. “Not much of an angel.”

When he realizes what Cas’s outstretched hand is meant for, Dean tries to get the man fighting his hold out of reach; he really does. But he’s too slow, both to comprehend and to move, so Cas’s palm hits the center of the man’s forehead. Light burns out of his eyes, then his mouth when it opens in a soundless scream, and all Dean can do is let go and back the fuck away as he crumples, lifeless, to the floor.

Cas’s head flies back in a scream of his own, but it’s not soundless; it’s the roar of a storm, lightning and thunder, a thousand devilishly whispering voices built into a cacophony. A gaping void flares out behind him, shaped like the shadow of his wings but so much emptier, and when he finally ceases his inhuman screaming and drops his head back to face Dean, his eyes overflow with tears and black ooze.

“Am. I.” The words come out wrecked, slow and grating with long, eerie silences between them. “An. Angel.” Cas’s neck snaps down, an angle that would mean death for anything human, but he just keeps repeating the same four phrase, toneless and dragging.

The boy’s screaming, the dad’s dead, Cas is—Cas needs to get out of here. Dean needs to get out of here, but he can’t leave Cas. Can’t leave the boy to that, can’t give up on Cas fixing Sam despite all evidence pointing to the increasing impossibility of that. He moves towards Cas and Cas doesn’t react, mumbling to himself and dripping black gore from his eyes and ears and mouth, so Dean takes a risk and grabs him by the arm. Cas lets it happen, doesn’t even seem to notice when Dean leverages the arm around his own shoulders to half drag him out the open door and force him into the passenger seat of the car.

The kid’s still losing his shit inside, left there with his bastard father’s charred corpse, but Dean can’t spare any worry or even much guilt when all of that needs to be directed at Cas. It’s the reservoir all over again, but worse. Ichor oozes from every pore and Cas starts convulsing, cutting off his terrible mantra by clenching his jaw so hard it makes Dean’s teeth hurt. Then his mouth rips open again, impossibly wide, splitting his whole face into darkness and impossibly long, sharp teeth.

It’s terrifying and horribly familiar, and Dean has no idea what to do. He’s frozen in indecision, torn between instinct, which demands he get the fuck out of the car or gank the thing that was Cas before it ganks him, and logic, telling him that thing was Cas. It is Cas, and Dean needs to save him somehow.

Before he can decide on a reaction, Cas grabs his arm. The grip is painful and unbreakable. Dean can't pull away. He’s failed, he thinks. He’s failed Sammy and Cas and the entire world, because he’s going to die and then Sam’s going to die and then the Leviathan are going to win.

Instead of lunging for him, though, Cas seems to be fighting to drag himself back under control. The teeth gnash, and then recede; the mouth shrinks. Inky goo covers his returned face, but it’s stale, stagnant. Nothing new drips out.

“Motel,” Cas says. “Shower.” He’s shaking, broken, looking down at his hands in horror. “Water. It washes the Leviathan away, for a while.”

He knows. He’s Cas again.

Dean really wishes he could find anything good in that.

*

“The fuck do you mean, turning into one?”

Cas is washed, changed into his spare cassock. Dean offered him street clothes, now that he knows he’s not really a priest, but Cas wanted the black robe and white collar. Now he sits on the bed, looking more at his hands than Dean, and tells Dean he’s becoming a monster.

“I can’t stop it. It’s not just them taking over my mind, not anymore. They weren’t satisfied with controlling me, they—It’s inside me. The emptiness, the hunger, the bleakness of Purgatory. I didn’t know what it was before, when I was—” He clenches his trembling hands, casts his eyes onto his bag on the ground instead. “When I was Emmanuel. But it was always there. And now I know.”

Dean paces, caught between anger and panic, not knowing what to do with either. “But it’s—look. Look, it only happens when you use your mojo, right? The healings, the—”

He doesn’t say it, swallows the word ‘smiting,’ but Cas tenses guiltily all the same.

Dean pushes on. “If you keep yourself charged up, you should be fine.”

Finally looking up to meet Dean’s eyes, Cas shakes his head. “It’s inevitable. It’s a matter of time, and a short one, at that. You need to get me to Sam.”

“You can’t—”

“I can.” Cas stands, voice back on firm ground for the first time in hours. “I’ve enough grace for that. I promised I’d help even when I didn’t know who you were, who he was. Now, it’s even more important. I did that to him. I remember that now. Please, let me do this one last good thing.”

There’s a wet shine to Cas’s eyes, or maybe that’s just the sting in Dean’s. Dean turns away.

“So, what. You put him back together then turn around and chomp us both? Seems kinda counter-productive to me.”

“No. I put him back together and then... And then. Do you still have an angel blade?”

Shock ices Dean’s spine and freezes him in place. He can’t even move to look at Cas, to beg him to be kidding. He tries and fails to force words out of his suddenly too-tight, too-dry throat, but nothing comes for a long time. Eventually, because Cas doesn’t break the silence, he manages to croak out, “You’re joking, right?”

Springs creak as Cas sits on the mattress again. “I’m not. It’s the only way, and you’ll have a brief window to do it immediately after I’ve healed Sam. It won’t work if, uh. If I’m changed completely—and I think I will be next time I exert myself. I was barely able to come back before, after...

“If I change,” he repeats, shaking his head as though to clear the memory, “the blade won’t work on me. You need to do it as soon as Sam’s better.”

It’s unthinkable, what Cas is asking of him. “There has to be another way, something else...”

“Unfortunately, I assure you, there’s not. Please, promise me you’ll do this for me. Don’t let me... I’d rather go to oblivion as an angel, even one as terrible as I am, than become that.”

Forcing himself free from his paralysis, Dean looks at Cas. He said once that he’s as big as the Chrysler Building, but in Jimmy Novak’s hunched body on a crappy motel bed, he looks so, so small and fragile. And with that, Dean can’t argue anymore. He knows; Cas is going to break, one way or another, and the only thing Dean can do for him now is help him break the least awful way.

By killing him.

“Fuck,” he says, and knows Cas hears it for acceptance.

Cas nods. “Thank you. I’m sorry to have to ask it of you, I’d...” He tries for a wry smile, but like everything else now, it comes out sideways. “I’d give anything to have things differently.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, soft. “Me too.”

Shifting uneasily, Cas darts his gaze down to the floor before purposefully looking back up into Dean’s eyes. “Dean.”

It’s the first time since losing Cas to the water that Dean hears his name spoken that way. The gravity of it catches him by surprise, so used to Emmanuel’s casual use that he’d forgotten the way it was supposed to sound in Cas’s voice. It makes him sick all over again, the bile he fought down in the Impala tightening his throat and souring the back of his mouth.

He didn’t know what it meant, before.

It takes the contrast for him to realize, to have to turn away from Cas’s earnest, entreating gaze and croak out, “Just—just a minute, I gotta—” and flee to the bathroom. He locks the door, not that it will do any good if Cas decides he wants in. He won’t, though. Wouldn’t risk using his grace now that he knows the consequences, and Dean relying on that is just about as shitty as Dean running away from what Cas is trying to tell him.

He didn’t know.

He doesn’t puke, but it’s a near thing. Standing over the sink with his hands braced on it because he can’t trust his own knees, he stares at his reflection and can’t figure out what he’s supposed to do with this information. He should. He should let Cas say it, the thing they’ve both been too chickenshit or angry or stupidly oblivious to say before. Or at least, those are his excuses; he doesn’t know Cas’s. Doesn’t want to know Cas’s.

Doesn’t want to hear Cas say any of it, in fact. They had their chances, years of them, and they blew it. Figuring it out now only to lose it might actually kill him. It’s gonna be nightmares and regrets and a whole lot of whiskey for the rest of his miserable, probably short life anyway, but Cas’s confession would put him over the edge. If he doesn’t hear the words, if he doesn’t say them back, he can shove it down and pretend none of it ever happened. It’s his goddamn specialty, the one thing in life he’s better at than hunting monsters.

And Cas, well, Cas will be dead anyway and Dean’ll be the one who has to kill him, so it’s not like it fucking matters if he’s selfish this one last time, anyway.

He turns on the faucet and splashes his face. The dingy incandescent light strip makes the water look black.

Back in the room, he still can’t look at Cas. “Come on,” he says instead, “we’ve still got a couple hours to Indiana.”

Silence follows his proclamation, heavy and thick like the air dragging through his lungs. He’s almost to the door when Cas tries again, and this time his voice cracks under the strain of what he’s trying to demand of it.

“Dean, please—”

“I said, let’s go. Sam’s waiting.”

Shitty as it is—though not really any less shitty than the rest of the situation—the reminder does its job. Cas follows him without another word. The slam of the car door isn’t anything like the rattle of Alastair chaining him to the rack, but it reverberates in Dean’s bones just the same way.

***

The hours to Northern Indiana State Hospital are excruciating.

They don’t speak. Dean doesn’t even turn on the radio. Castiel is left alone with his thoughts, which are dark even without the Leviathan slipping in. His grace holds, for now, but it’s only a matter of time. He wishes he could speed them along to Sam, to be sure they get there before it’s too late for him to make amends, but even that use is too risky.

So he waits, tries and fails to silence the fear slowly drowning him. He’s—grateful, relieved, desperate—to have the chance to heal Sam from what his own misguided hands wrought, but part of him longs to return to Emmanuel’s ignorance. The irony of his musings on Dean’s lack of faith hurts more than it ought to, all injuries considered. It’s such a small indignity compared to all those before, and one known only to him, but it shreds his already tattered heart.

It brings him back to the start of everything, and he can’t go back there. All his choices, all his mistakes, things that could have turned out differently—if only.

For a nearly timeless thing, and he was a thing before he was Cas, all his regrets are terribly recent. Dean is the best and worst of them. He cannot tell him that, can’t force that additional burden when he’s already asking so much. He’s grateful, now, that Dean stopped him before. He’ll make what reparation he can in the time he has, and if it’s not enough, at least it will be something.

He stares at the mile markers as they slip past, as fast as shooting stars, and allows himself the delusion that they aren’t forming a countdown to his demise.

When they pass a stalled semi-truck with a large pool of darkly shimmering oil slicking the ground beneath it, he has to look away. It sticks with him even when he closes his eyes, the sheen of slippery black a reminder of what he’s becoming moment by moment, what the universe he has wronged in so many ways won’t let him forget.

His fingers itch with self-destruction he’s never sought in all his long existence, an urge to take up his own blade before the truly timeless hunger can overtake him. He does not give in. He owes Sam better than that.

*

Even by the time they arrive at the hospital, not another word has passed between them. Cas doesn’t know what he’d say, anyway. The only words spinning through his mind are ones he won’t allow himself to give voice. Dean already knows everything of import; all the rest is Cas’s burden to bear, and not for much longer. He can shoulder them for the time that’s left, spare the Winchesters whatever pain he can by holding those thoughts to himself.

It’s little enough sacrifice after everything they’ve done for him, and everything he’s done to them. Everything he’s not yet finished doing to them. It will hurt Dean, he knows, to kill him. He’d absolve him of that responsibility if he could, but he won’t have enough of his own mind left to wield the blade himself. Sam doesn’t have the capacity to understand, and by the time he will, it will be far too late to explain.

It must be Dean.

He hopes, nearly prays—but that’s Emmanuel, not Cas, a human habit. Cas knows there’s nothing worth praying to. He hopes that Dean will be fast enough, sure enough of his aim. If he’s overtaken by the Leviathan, Dean won’t able to kill him with the angel blade. And even if they did escape him, and later found a way to kill him, he’d be trapped in Purgatory as an abomination. Maybe it’s no more than he deserves after everything he’s done, but he still doesn’t want it to happen.

Sam shrinks back on his bed when they enter the room, eyes darting between them as he whispers frantically, “Not real. You’re not real. You aren’t here.”

“Hey, Sammy,” Dean says, but Sam keeps up his chant. To Cas, he says, “I told you, or, uh, Emmanuel, about the hallucinations. He’s been seeing Lucifer. Was just sometimes, then it got worse and worse. Now, as far as I know, it’s the twenty-four-hour Satan show, except when the docs knock him out.”

He did this.

He will fix it.

He nods, taking a step towards Sam on the bed before he stops and turns back to Dean. He allows himself one last look, hoping he doesn’t give himself away too much. It’s selfish, but he can’t help running his eyes over the body he knows intimately in all the angelic ways and none of the human ones. It’s funny, in the worst sort of way, how the one thing he kept above all else when he knew himself as Emmanuel was his love of Dean. Even if he hadn’t known to put that name on it without the context of everything else.

Then he has to tear himself away, because he can feel tears welling up and he won’t make Dean witness that. They spill over as he sits on the edge of the bed next to Sam, but at least Dean is at his back and can’t see them.

Cas can’t see Dean pulling the angel blade from inside his jacket, but the rustle of canvas behind him tells him it’s happening.

Forcing his voice to come out steady despite the way his heart feels like it’s vibrating his chest to pieces, Cas tells Sam, “I’m sorry.” Just in case he can understand, or remember later; or maybe Dean can tell him. He should know. Cas would like to say more, but he can’t keep his breath under control enough for it to sound the way it should. Like the rest, it will have to be enough.

He lifts his fingers to Sam’s temple, following it when Sam flinches away, and pulls at the grace of his being. It flows to his hand, but no further; it cannot do what he’s asking of it. He can’t heal Sam, can’t fix what he’s broken, and he exhales a shaky breath that carries with it a small sound, one he didn’t mean to let out.

It makes Dean take a step towards him, and that makes Cas firm up his resolve, delve into Sam’s mind to see if he can find what’s stopping him and figure out a way around it. There must be a way; he must make this, at least, right. He cannot allow Dean to lose his brother.

What he finds is so immediate and so familiar that for a horrifying moment he thinks it’s too late; he’s pushed himself too far and his mind has been consumed by the ravening Old Ones. But it’s not quite right—instead of endless darkness and hunger, what he feels is fire and pain and ice. This isn’t his consciousness but Sam’s, poisoned by Hell.

The similarity, once he’s over the shock of it, turns out to be a good thing. He can’t heal Sam, as such, but this is an type of infection he knows. He can draw it into himself, stick it into the same tainted well that holds the Leviathan, and let them rot there together while Sam is freed. It’s a crippling proposition—or it would be, if he were going to survive it. As it is, the two forces of madness won’t have time to battle for dominance over him.

Drawing up his grace again, he pulls instead of pushing. Red agony flares up and into him, burning through him along the same path the ichor oozed. It’s too much to stand, but his grace holds out long enough for him see it through to the end. As he lets go, laughter echoes through his skull, and he scrambles to his feet to try to escape it. It follows him, coming from everywhere at once including, he thinks, his own throat.

Sam looks up at him, eyes confused but clear, and asks, “Cas?” Then, louder, “Dean, what—”

The touch-cold blade, sliding soft and sharp into the heat of his back, feels like a benediction.

**Author's Note:**

>  **Warnings/Tags:** Castiel is turning into a Leviathan and asks Dean to kill him after he heals Sam.
> 
> [Here's](http://impalartsociopath.tumblr.com/post/160520996685/the-miracle-of-minor-mercies-written-by-a) the art post one more time if you want to reblog, and [here's one for the fic!](http://alxdiamond.tumblr.com/post/160522002203/the-miracle-of-minor-mercies-a-destielreversebang)


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